Tuesday 9 May 2017

Dan Cole

Podcast Episode - 10
Daniel Richard Cole

Tighthead Prop - England & Leicester Tigers
highest scoring England prop of all time

Nickname: Viking
D.O.B: 09/05/1987 (29 Years Old)
Height: 6ft 3 in
Weight: 19st 5lbs
Wife: Isobel Cole

Dan Cole is one of England's most capped props who has played his whole club career for Leicester Tigers. He represents England and this summer will be a 2nd time British and Irish Lions tourist after previously being part of the successful 2013 tour to Australia.

He was born and bred in Leicester, which according to him, is the reason he "doesn't do cuddles". He attended Robert Smyth school in Leicestershire and played his early rugby career for South Leicestershire.

His wife Isobel Cole is also a cousin to Ben and Tom Youngs.

Before home games he eats porridge and before away games he eats spaghetti bolognaise (your guess is as good as mine??) 

For his reading pleasure he devours the works of the Philosopher, Linguist and Cognitive Scientist, Noam Chomsky as i'm sure many other Props across the world do..

Dan Cole - The Philosopher...
Club:

As mentioned, Dan Cole is a career Leicester tigers player. He has 184 appearances for them and 4 tries.

His 1st team debut was in October 2007 in the EDF Energy cup vs Bath. He then spent most of the rest of the 2007/8 season on loan at Bedford to ensure game time.

He also had a loan spell at Nottingham in 2009, but was back in time to play for Leicester in the successful 2009 Premiership final vs Toby Booth's London Irish.

He has also won the Premiership title with Leicester in 2010 and 2013.

International:

Dan Cole has 77 International caps. 74 of these caps are for England and 3 are for the British & Irish Lions from the 2013 tour to Australia.

He has scored 4 tries for England, which along with Jason Leonard makes him England's top try scoring prop.

He represented England at U18, U19 and U20 level before getting his England Saxons debut vs Portugal in 2009.

His first full international cap came in Feb 2010 vs Wales in the Six Nations.

As an England International he has beaten every Top Tier nation.

Additional Info:

He is widely considered one of the top Tighthead props in the world, but in 2016 came under heavy criticism from the Australian head coach Michael Cheika (bloody Aussies), who claimed that Cole had been scrummaging illegally his entire career! Many top Rugby coaches & players jumped to Dan's defence though and the nonsense was soon put to bed. He may claim that he has no desire to find himself out on the wing, but this rare footage from 2012 would suggest otherwise - don't quit your day job Dan!




He isn't one who seems to at all seek the limelight, but did speak out at the start of 2017 when Richard Cockerill was sacked as Leicester Tigers coach after a 23 year association with the club. There were rumours that the sacking of Cockerill was due to a group of players who demanded to the board that he had to leave.

Cole was quick to dismiss any form of player coup but did say that he felt change was needed and that he had spoken with the board and given his opinion when asked by them. It was one of the rare times in sport when a top International actually seemed willing to talk openly about a highly publicised incident!

Despite all of the seriousness depicted, Dan has a light hearted side too as seen in this Mr & Mrs! Quiz with fellow England and now Lions front row forward Jamie George.




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